William Wilkie
Rev. William Wilkie (5 October 1721 - 10 Oct. 1772) was a Scottish poet and cleric,Alexander Campbell, William Wilkie, D.D., Introduction to the History of Poetry in Scotland, 1798, 230. English Poetry, 1579-1830, Center for Applied Technologies in the Humanities, Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University. Web, Jan. 10, 2017. called by David Hume "the Scottish Homer."George Eyre-Todd, Scottish Poetry in the Eighteenth Century, 1896, 1:160. English Poetry, 1579-1830, Center for Applied Technologies in the Humanities, Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University. Web, Jan. 10, 2017. Life Overview Wilke was born in Linlithgowshire, son of a farmer, and educated at Edinburgh. He entered the Church, and became minister of Ratho, Midlothian, in 1756, and professor of natural philosophy at St. Andrews in 1759. In 1757 he published the Epigoniad, dealing with the Epigoni, sons of the 7 heroes who fought against Thebes. He also wrote Moral Fables in Verse.John William Cousin, "Wilkie, William," A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature. London: Dent / New York: Dutton, 1910, 407-408. Wikisource, Web, Mar. 18, 2018. Youth and education Wilkie was born at Echlin, parish of Dalmeny, Midlothian, son of James Wilkie, a farmer. He was educated at Dalmeny parish school and Edinburgh University.Among his college contemporaries were John Home, David Hume, William Robertson, and Adam Smith.Bayne, 258. His father dying during his curriculum, he succeeded to the unexpired lease of a farm at Fishers' Tryste, near Edinburgh. This he carried on in the interests of his 3 sisters and himself, prosecuting at the same time his studies for the ministry of the church of Scotland. Career Licensed as a preacher by the presbytery of Linlithgow on 29 May 1745, he combined, while waiting for a charge, the pursuits of literature and scientific agriculture. On 17 May 1753 he was appointed, under the patronage of the Earl of Lauderdale, assistant to John Guthrie, parish minister of Ratho, Midlothian, on whose death in 1756 he became sole incumbent. His learning and his abstracted moods — his occasionally omitting, for instance, to put off his hat before entering the pulpit — somewhat marred the success of his pastorate. In 1759 he was appointed professor of natural philosophy at the University of St. Andrews, where he did sound work, devoting his leisure to successful experiments in moorland farming. Regarded by his college friends as the ablest of the distinguished students of his day (Mackenzie, Life of John Home), Wilkie continued to impress later contemporaries by his originality, remarkable attainments, and conversational power, and to shock them by his eccentricity and slovenly habits (cf. Lockhart, Life of Scott, v. 25, ed. 1837). Meeting him at Alexander Carlyle's in 1759, Charles Townshend (1725–1767) considered that no man of his acquaintance "approached so near the two extremes of a god and a brute" (Autobiography of Dr. Alexander Carlyle, chap. x. p. 394). Credited with parsimony, Wilkie was nevertheless charitable without ostentation. He had, he said, learned economy through his having "shaken hands with poverty up to the very elbow."Bayne, 259. Subject to ague, he weakened his constitution by excessive clothing and absurd sleeping arrangements. He died on 10 October 1772. At his death he left property worth £3,000. Writing In 1757 Wilkie published The Epigoniad in 9 books, based on the 4th book of The Iliad, and written in heroic couplets in the manner of Pope's ‘Homer.’ To a 2nd edition in 1759 he appended an ingenious apologetic "Dream in the manner of Spenser." On the appearance of this edition Hume warmly eulogised The Epigoniad in a letter to the Critical Review, complaining that the journal had unduly depreciated the poem when first published. Wilkie has no genuine right to be called "the Scottish Homer," but as a mere achievement in verse his "epic" is creditable; it has a fair measure of fluency, its imagery is apt and strong, and it is brightened by occasional felicities of phrase, descriptive epithet, and antithetical delineation. In 1768 Wilkie published a small volume of 16 Fables, in iambic tetrameter reminiscent of Gay, with an added pithy and pointed "Dialogue between the Author and a Friend" in dexterous heroics. The 16th fable, "The Hare and the Partan" crab, is a notable exercise in the vernacular of Midlothian. Recognition In 1766 the university of St. Andrews conferred on Wilkie the honorary degree of D.D. Robert Fergusson, one of his students, eulogised him in a memorial eclogue (Fergusson, Poems, 29, ed. Grosart). Publications *''The Epigoniad: A poem, in nine books. Edinburgh: Hamilton, Balfour, & Neill, 1757; London: J. Murray / Wilson & Nicol, 1769. *''Fables in Verse. London: E. & C. Dilly / A. Kincaid & J. Bell, Edinburgh, 1768. Translated *Dante Alighieri, Dante's Inferno. Ediburgh: Edmonston & Douglas, 1866. Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.Search results = au:William Wilkie, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Jan. 10, 2017. See also *List of British poets References * . Wikisource, Web, Jan. 10, 2017. Notes External links ;Poems *Rev. William Wilkie(1721-1772) at English Poetry, 1579-1830 ;About * Wilkie, William Category:1721 births Category:1772 deaths Category:Academics of the University of St Andrews Category:Scottish poets Category:18th-century poets Category:Scottish academics Category:Scottish clergy Category:English-language poets Category:Poets